


acceptance is a small and quiet room

by shellybelle



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M, author has not seen AOU yet, author is frantically writing as much as she can before everything gets Jossed, no AOU spoilers beyond casting and old interviews
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-27
Updated: 2015-04-27
Packaged: 2018-03-26 01:01:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3831334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shellybelle/pseuds/shellybelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Scarlet Witch twists her mind and leaves her unconscious, Natasha wakes to silence, and to a familiar ceiling. The wind smells like wheat and corn, the bed under her warm and comfortable, and she knows immediately that she can't be anywhere but Iowa, in a farm she's stayed far away from for years, where a conversation she can't avoid much longer waits for her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	acceptance is a small and quiet room

**Author's Note:**

> Update: Author has now seen AOU. Author is hella grumpy about her ship and is actively writing extensive, AOU-compliant fix-it-fic. In the meantime, though, you may now spoil Author in the comments. Thanks for not doing so thus far! <3

Natasha wakes to silence, and to a familiar ceiling.

 

Not entirely to silence, Natasha thinks, laying still and looking up. She can hear the chirping of crickets and the rustling of tree branches outside, wrapped in the soft rushing of wind, and beside her in bed, Bruce’s breathing is calm and even. She turns her head to look at him, her eyes adjusting to the darkness. There are circles under his eyes, but his face is peaceful, if pale. Reluctant to wake him, she turns her gaze back to the ceiling. She recognizes the mobile in the corner, the large window to her left, and the soft woven comforter pulled over her.

 

She hasn’t been in this bed for years, but it cradles her as comfortably as it always has.

 

Moving slowly so as not to disturb Bruce, she pushes the blanket back and sits up, then slips out of bed. Bruce turns in his sleep but doesn’t wake, and Natasha spares him a soft smile, reaching over to brush her fingers through his hair. His lips curl upwards and Natasha exhales a laugh, pulling her fingers back and slipping from the bed.

 

There are two piles of clothing on the dresser across from the bed, and Natasha picks the one clearly meant for her, a pair of her own leggings, left here who knows how long ago, and a familiar men’s button-down-shirt. It feels good to be out of her own clothes, sweat- and dust-stained from battle, though what she really wants is a shower.

 

A shower will have to wait, though. She can see a light outside, and she knows what it is.

 

Padding across the floor on silent feet, she pulls the door open. It swings open on well-oiled hinges, which should surprise her, but somehow doesn’t. The rest of the hallway is dark and quiet, and Natasha makes her way to the stairs, automatically skipping the one creaky step halfway down the flight.

 

Downstairs smells of fresh soap and recent cleaning. Most of the windows in the living room and kitchen are open, letting the cool evening air in, carrying with it the sweet scents of corn and wheat. Natasha allows herself a smile at the familiarity of it, crossing through the living room. She pulls the knitted afghan off the back of the sofa and wraps it around her shoulders, and then steps out the front door and onto the porch.

 

Clint has his back to her. Natasha has no doubt he heard her before she even opened the door, but he doesn’t turn, and she takes a moment, leaning against the door and watching him. He sits on the top of the steps with his face tilted up to the starry sky. There’s a six-pack of bottled beer beside him, an empty bottle sitting beside it, another missing--it must be in his hands. He’s changed his clothes, his suit replaced by jeans and his battered leather jacket, the collar of a flannel shirt barely visible. She can see dried blood on the back of his neck.

 

When she can’t watch him in silence anymore, she says, quietly, “Clint.”

 

He turns to her. For a moment she sees his unfettered expression, drawn and almost haunted, and then he erases it with a smile. “Hey,” he says. “Look who’s awake.”

 

His voice is hoarse, his eyes just barely red-rimmed, but his smile reaches his eyes, and she doesn’t doubt his happiness at seeing her upright. Scarlet Witch’s stunt had been a nightmare to experience, she knew that, but couldn’t imagine what it would have felt like to be the one watching. “About time, I suppose,” she says. “How long have we been out?”

 

“Almost twelve hours.” Clint pats the step beside him, and Natasha pulls the blanket more tightly around her shoulders, coming to sit down next to him. She sits close enough to brush her arm against his, a wordless offer of support. “Flew us back here and hauled all of you up to bed. Getting Stark out that armor was a pain in the ass until I found the safety. Had time to air out the place and do a bit of shopping, but I didn’t want to leave for long. We’re off the grid, but not that far off.”

 

Natasha hears what he’s not saying, and asks the question even though she knows the answer. “Have you slept?”

 

Clint laughs, soft and humorless. He turns the bottle of beer in his hands. It’s half-full. “I can’t sleep here, Nat,” he says. He looks at her, his gaze searching hers, for what, she doesn’t know. “Too many ghosts.”

 

Natasha knows about ghosts. She has a road of ghosts stretching out behind her farther than she can remember, and some of them live so vividly in her memory that she can’t help but see them painted on the backs of her her eyelids when she lays her head down to sleep. But none of her ghosts are like Clint’s. “But you brought us here.”

 

“We needed a safe house.” Clint looks straight ahead, and with his head turned Natasha can see that the dried blood on the back of his neck curves around to disappear under the collar of his shirt. “Nobody knows about this place. It wasn’t in any of SHIELD’s records, and certainly not in Stark’s. I disabled the tracking on the Quinjet.”

 

“Thank you.”

 

He shrugs, taking a sip of his beer. They sit together in silence. Once, it would have been easier. It still is, sometimes--they find each other’s eyes in a crowded room with ease, can have a conversation without speaking, know each other’s body language as well as their own. But here in this place, in the still country air, the silence feels stifling.

 

Natasha breaks it. “You need to sleep, Clint,” she says. “As much as the rest of us. Maybe more.”

 

Clint doesn’t respond right away. His left hand his curled around his beer bottle, right hand curled over his left, fingertips brushing over his bare ring finger. The indentation from his wedding ring has long since faded, but Natasha knows the sensation he’s searching for. “Lila took her first steps on this porch,” he says. “Did I ever tell you that?”

 

He hasn’t spoken about his family to her in years. “No,” she says. “No, you didn’t.”

 

“Right behind us.” He shifts, turning his body toward her to point between them. “I was standing about there,” he says. “And Laura--” his voice cracks, and he swallows, a visible motion. “Laura was there, maybe a few feet down. Cooper was probably right where you’re sitting. He was two and a half, maybe almost three, and his job was to stand on the stairs in case she went rogue.”

  
Natasha can’t help her smile. “She’d have come by it honestly,” she says. Lila had been a ferocious little thing, fiery and wild, with an infectious laugh and her father’s sparkling, mischievous eyes. “Did she?”

 

“Nope. Let go of Laura’s hands and came right to me. Well--she tried to. Crashed halfway there.” Clint laughs, and this time it’s real; he ducks his head and his eyes crinkle at the corners. “Then she hauled herself up on the doorstep and came the rest of the way. Damn near cried.”

 

“Liar,” Natasha says, teasing him, just a little.

 

“Alright, maybe I cried for real.” He’s smiling now, at least, holding himself in the memory. She knows that feeling. She sees the moment it fades, leaving him tired and drawn once more. “Was the bed okay?”

 

“You know it was,” Natasha says, but she lets him change the subject, for now. “Thanks for the clothes.”

 

“Don’t think I forgot that that’s the shirt you always stole.”

 

Clint’s voice is gently playful, and Natasha winks at him. “It’s the softest one,” she says, and means it. The flannel has been worn to smoothness, and the faint scent of Clint’s cologne and shampoo had always clung to it. It was one of the first smells Natasha had associated purely with comfort and safety, though she’d deny it to her grave. “Laura and I had a bet going over whether you’d ever stop trying to take it back.”

 

He snorts. “Shouldn’t be surprised about that, I suppose. If it wasn’t you wearing it, it was her.”

 

Natasha knows that, too. Laura’s scent has stayed on the shirt as well, mingled in with Clint’s, a softer smell, lavender and wheat. When Clint had pulled Natasha out of SHIELD’s line of fire, convinced Fury and Phil to let him bring her in, he had brought her here as soon as SHIELD had cleared her through psych. Laura Barton had greeted her with kindness and calm, had teased her husband about his penchant for strays, and Clint had grinned at her with such love and lack of chagrin that Natasha had seen in a moment that his reasons for bringing her in truly had nothing to do with wanting to sleep with her.

 

Laura had been pregnant with Cooper then, five or six months along, and Natasha had been fascinated by how casually she had moved, as if entirely unconsumed with the life growing inside her. Now and again in her first few days at the farm, though, Natasha would catch Laura stroking her belly in quiet moments, would see Clint pause to rest a hand over the swell, a small, uncertain smile playing around his lips and eyes. It would make Natasha’s heart ache, though she couldn’t have explained why.

 

Natasha had liked Laura. She was funny and silly and kind and brave, and had been the first woman Natasha ever truly trusted. She had loved Cooper, too, with his mother’s dark, expressive eyes and his father’s nose and grin; she had loved Lila, ever curious, with Clint’s love of climbing and equal penchant for falling and getting back up.

 

She had loved all of them so fiercely it made her chest hurt, and when they’d died, she’d shattered beside Clint.

 

“Nat?”

 

Natasha stirs herself back to the present, turning to meet Clint’s concerned eyes. “Sorry,” she says. “Lost in thought.”

 

Clint nods, lips twitching in a slight smile. “Yeah. That happens out here.”

 

She can hear the guilt creeping back into his voice. “Clint,” she says. “Clint, it wasn’t your fault.”

 

He stiffens. “What would you call it, then?” There’s a challenge in his voice, angry and harsh. “Nat, I wasn’t here. I wasn’t here.”

 

And that was it, the thing that had almost destroyed their friendship forever, and Natasha still doesn’t know how it didn’t. When they had come, when Clint’s family had been wiped out, Laura and Cooper and little Lila, Clint had been halfway across the world, and he had been halfway across the world because Natasha had needed him. Because Natasha had needed him, and he had gone without question.

 

Because Natasha had needed him, his family was gone.

 

The old guilt and rage boils up in Natasha’s chest, burning up to sting at her eyes. “You weren’t here because of me, Clint. If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine.”

 

Clint laughs, and the sound is rough and grating. “You were tied up in a cell in Tanjier, Nat, not taking me on a joyride across Europe. It was my call to go after you.”

 

“SHIELD could have sent a team.”

 

“SHIELD believes in acceptable losses.” He stops, snorts. “Believed in acceptable losses.”

 

But there were still losses, Natasha wants to say. Only instead of me, it was them.

 

And it should have been me.

 

“But you do blame me,” she says, because she’s tired and hurting, and it makes her honest, and it makes her cut to the bone.

 

Clint starts at that. “Nat, no,” he says, so earnestly that she almost believes it. “No, I don’t.”

 

“Would you have gone?”

 

It comes out like a challenge, but she doesn’t mean it to. Natasha swallows the lump in her throat and tries again. “If it had been anyone but me in that cell, would you have gone?”

 

His mouth opens, just a fraction, and then he turns away, and it’s answer enough. She’s always suspected, but the confirmation makes the guilt settle deeper into her bones. “If you hadn’t come for me--”

 

“It won’t bring them back,” Clint cuts her off, firm. “Blaming you for it. It won’t bring them back.”

 

She reaches out and curls a hand over his cheek, gently turns his face to look back at her. “Neither will blaming yourself, Clint.”

 

He holds her gaze for a long moment, and then drops his eyes. “No,” he says, and it sounds tired, a bone-weary answer. “I know.”

 

Natasha lets her hand linger for a moment more, brushing her thumb over his cheekbone. It’s an intimate touch, she knows, one she isn’t really entitled to, hasn’t been for years. She does it anyway. “Would it have changed things?” she asks, and hates herself for it. But she wants to know. “Between us?”

 

Clint’s gaze goes sharp. “Don’t ask me that, Tasha,” he says, and it’s Tasha, not Nat, and she’s only Tasha when he’s overwhelmed, when he’s feeling lost and exhausted.

 

(Once, a long time ago, Tasha was teasing and soft, wrapped in love and tinged with sadness.)

 

“I want to know.”

 

He sets his beer bottle down, rubs the back of his neck. She knows he’s trying not to look at her. She waits. Finally, he sighs. “You’re my best friend, Tash,” he says, dragging his eyes back to hers. “Isn’t that enough?”

 

Natasha feels suddenly small, wrapped in a blanket and Clint’s shirt, with the smell of his wife’s perfume still clinging to the fabric. It’s not a feeling she’s familiar with. But there’s anger under her skin, too, shameful anger, but anger nonetheless. “We could have been more than that.”

 

Clint barks out a laugh. It’s stiff and unnatural. “We tried that,” he says, picking up his beer bottle and taking a sip. “If I remember right, it didn’t work out.”

 

“It could have.”

 

“You shot me,” he points out.

 

“True,” she admits. “But you deserved it. And I didn’t shoot anything important.”

 

He narrows his eyes at her for a moment, like he can’t figure out if she’s joking, and she smiles at him--not her Black Widow smile, cool and calculating, but a smile that’s always been his, cautious and a little bit gentle. Clint looks down, his own smile tugging at his lips. “I don’t know, Nat,” he says finally. “Things might’ve been different.” He looks sidelong at her. “Doesn’t make a difference now, though.”

 

It’s a statement, not a question, but she hears the question anyway. She thinks of Bruce, sleeping upstairs. “No.” She wraps the blanket more tightly around herself. “You had your chance,” she says, as kindly as she can make it. “You had a hundred chances.”

 

“I know.”

 

“I wasn’t going to wait forever.”

  
“Nat, I know.” There’s no bitterness in his voice, only resignation, and Natasha thinks that that’s what hurts the most. He reaches over, tugs the blanket to better cover her shoulders. The gesture looks automatic, thoughtless, and he runs his fingers over the fabric as he pulls away from her. “He’s a good man.”

 

She nods. “I know that.”

 

“You deserve a good man.”

 

Natasha laughs softly. “I know that, too.” And she does, though it’s taken her years to realize, that she is not beyond absolution, that she is deserving of love. She pushes some of her hair behind her ear, and looks at him, at the familiar curve of his cheek, the stubble on his chin, the mussed sweep of his hair. “But you’re a good man too, Clint,” she says quietly. “And she wouldn’t want you to mourn forever.”

 

Clint makes a sound, brittle and rough, and she realizes with a start that it was supposed to be a laugh. “No,” he says. “No, she’d be pissed at me. ‘Get your head out of your ass, Barton. You’re useless when you’re moping.’”

 

“Then she’d hit you on the ass with a newspaper,” Natasha suggests, because it’s true.

 

“Something like that,” Clint says, and then his face crumples, and he folds in on himself, swaying even as he starts to lower his head. Natasha reaches for him on instinct and pulls him into her arms. He’s shaking even as he wraps his arms around her, his face buried in the crook between her neck and shoulder, and his sobs are silent but shuddering, and Natasha can feel his tears sinking into her skin. She holds him tight, stroking his hair back, kisses his temples. She doesn’t shush him, doesn’t tell him not to cry--she knows how cathartic the tears can be.

 

It’s several moments before she realizes that some of the tears she can feel are her own, seeping from under her lashes without her permission. They’re angry tears, furious with loss, of Laura’s steady kindness and Cooper’s grin and Lila’s sparkling eyes, angry for Clint’s broken heart and her own as well, for everything that they could have had, for the ghosts that will always lie between them, as impermeable as a wall. She lets herself cry, the lingering pain and exhaustion of Scarlet Witch’s spell taking over, and feel’s Clint’s fingers clench in the back of her shirt, and can’t tell if he’s clinging to her, or Laura, or both of them.

 

Clint settles before she does, his sobs lessening until he’s holding her, not the other way around. His fingers run through her hair, a gentle, familiar motion, slow and soothing, and Natasha feels herself quiet, even if she can’t quite open her eyes. She lifts her head and Clint’s thumbs brush under her eyelashes, sweeping away tears, and she feels the press of his lips against her forehead, replaced a moment later by the pressure of his forehead leaning against hers.

 

“I love you,” he murmurs, and it should feel like too little, too late, but deep down she’s always known it. The words settle into her bones, easing away the guilt and chill. “You know that, don’t you?”

 

Natasha nods against his forehead. Tears gone, she feels drained and exhausted once more, her body yearning for more rest. She can’t say the words back to him--love is for children, she’d told Loki, years ago, and the words will always feel bitter in her throat--but she lifts her head and kisses his temple, his cheek, his neck, and lets him pull her into a close, desperate hug, his hand curling around the back of her neck. She puts her head on his chest and listens to his heartbeat, firm and steady and human.

 

After a long moment, she lets her grip relax and pulls away from him, wiping her eyes. Clint looks as wrecked as she feels, his eyes red and puffy, and Natasha loves him for that, the open honesty on his face. She manages a watery smile, reaching out to touch the tear marks on his cheek, and pushes herself to her feet. “Come,” she says. “Let’s go inside.”

 

Clint hesitates. “Nat, I can’t--”

 

“Just to the kitchen,” she interrupts, gently. “To make something hot to drink, because if we’re going to reminisce, we’re not going to do it over crappy beer. And then to the living room, because I know you won’t be able to sleep upstairs, but you might manage a few hours on the couch. And you need at least a few hours, because when Stark and Rogers wake up, you’re not going to want to be dealing with them on a sleep deficit.”

 

Clint’s expression relaxes. “You know that, do you?”

 

“First hand,” she agrees. The space between them feels loose and relaxed, and Natasha notices with a start the absence of a tension she hadn’t realized was there. She holds out her hand, softening her voice. “Come inside, Clint.”

 

He takes her hand, his fingers slotting into place around hers, and she pulls him to his feet. He wavers slightly and she catches him with an arm around his. “Sorry,” he mumbles. “Long day.”

 

“Lightweight,” she teases, and he chuckles, and it’s the first genuine laugh she’s heard all night.

 

“You try drinking on no sleep after flying halfway around the world and carrying five deadweight Avengers up a bunch of stairs.”

 

His voice is deceptively light, and Natasha squeezes his arm. “I know,” she says. “Thank you.”

 

He shrugs. “Part of the job,” he says.

 

She stops, and looks at him until he meets her eyes. “Not for that,” she says.

 

Clint’s expression softens. “I know.”

 

Natasha squeezes his hand. “Come,” she says, and, casting a last look over his shoulder, Clint slips past her into the house. Natasha hesitates a moment more, looking out at the still and quiet fields, and thinks she can hear a child’s laughter on the soft evening wind, a mother’s gentle encouragement. “Goodnight,” Natasha says quietly, and steps inside, closing the door behind her.

 

-

 

Bruce finds them in the morning when he pads down the worn wooden stairs in borrowed clothing, too tired from the lingering bone-stretching exhaustion of a transformation to be too concerned by the unfamiliar surroundings. They’re curled together on a sofa, Clint’s head pillowed on Natasha’s shoulder, her arms wrapped loosely around him, both of their faces slack and tear-streaked. A pair of ceramic mugs sit on the coffee table in front of the sofa.

 

A tiny, insecure voice in his mind tells him to feel jealous, that something must be wrong, but Bruce knows enough about body language to know that what he’s seeing is none of his business, nothing to get upset over. He can tell after only a few moments that there are stories in this house, stories, he thinks, and ghosts, too.

 

But they’re not his ghosts, and not his stories. He considers going closer, trying to lay a kiss on Natasha’s forehead, but he knows well enough that he’s not nearly stealthy enough to get close enough without waking them both, and there’s a peace in the room that he doesn’t want to disturb. As he watches, still and silent on the landing, Natasha makes a soft sound in her sleep, shifting slightly, and Clint mumbles something in response, shuffling to accommodate the change in her position. They settle back to stillness, and Bruce finds a wry, fond smile on his lips when he realizes the soft rasping sound he can hear is Natasha’s faint snoring.

 

The moment is peaceful, still and relaxed and almost pure. Bruce lingers for a few seconds more, and then withdraws into the kitchen in search of a cup of tea. He has questions, and the insecure voice is still there, and he knows that in a few hours Tony or Steve will come crashing down the stairs in a fit of questions and righteous fury, but for now the house is quiet and calm. He finds a kettle and fills it at the sink, looking out the window over miles of field and farmland. He opens the window, and the scent of corn and wheat fills the room, an echo of lavender on the wind.

 

He runs his hand over the stitching on the window curtains, wondering about the silent stories in this house. Wherever they are, Bruce thinks, turning off the tap, it’s a good place, with love and comfort clearly built into every nook and room. He puts the kettle on the stove, and, enjoying the country air and the peaceful silence, sits down at the table to wait for the house to wake.

 

 


End file.
